Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show BusinessTelevision has conditioned us to tolerate visually entertaining material measured out in spoonfuls of time, to the detriment of rational public discourse and reasoned public affairs. In this eloquent, persuasive book, Neil Postman alerts us to the real and present dangers of this state of affairs, and offers compelling suggestions as to how to withstand the media onslaught. Before we hand over politics, education, religion, and journalism to the show business demands of the television age, we must recognize the ways in which the media shape our lives and the ways we can, in turn, shape them to serve out highest goals. |
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Page 9
... human , keeps us human , and in fact defines what hu- man means . This is not to say that if there were no other means of communication all humans would find it equally convenient to speak about the same things in the same way . We know ...
... human , keeps us human , and in fact defines what hu- man means . This is not to say that if there were no other means of communication all humans would find it equally convenient to speak about the same things in the same way . We know ...
Page 11
... human events and thus nour- ishes the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences . Moment to moment , it turns out , is not God's conception , or nature's . It is man conversing with himself about and through ...
... human events and thus nour- ishes the belief in an independent world of mathematically measurable sequences . Moment to moment , it turns out , is not God's conception , or nature's . It is man conversing with himself about and through ...
Page 66
... human interest news " played little role in shaping the decisions and actions of readers , it was at least local — about places and people within their expe- rience — and it was not always tied to the moment . The human- interest ...
... human interest news " played little role in shaping the decisions and actions of readers , it was at least local — about places and people within their expe- rience — and it was not always tied to the moment . The human- interest ...
Contents
The Medium Is the Metaphor | 3 |
Media as Epistemology | 16 |
Typographic America | 30 |
Copyright | |
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advertising Aldous Huxley America amusing argument audience become believe Billy Graham called celebrities Charles Finney claims classroom coherent communication conversation course created culture Diff'rent Strokes Douglas eighteenth entertainment epistemology example exposition fact Frye Huxley idea implied intellectual irrelevant Jerry Falwell Jimmy Swaggart language learning Lincoln-Douglas debates literacy Marshall McLuhan matter means medium ment merely metaphor Mimi mind movie nature newscaster newspaper nineteenth century oral Orwell Pat Robertson photograph play preachers President printed word printing press problem public discourse question radio rational readers reason religion religious Reverend Robert Schuller rock music sense serious Sesame Street show business sion social speech story symbolic tele telegraph television commercial television program television screen television show television's thing tion tradition truth typographic viewers visual Walter Ong watch writing written word York